Aereo sues CBS to preempt deluge of copyright suits

CBS had threatened to sue startup again in Boston—and everywhere else.

Aereo, the startup that uses tens of thousands of tiny antennas to provide TV-over-Internet service, is getting tired of being threatened with constant legal attacks. The company was sued by broadcasters who said Aereo was essentially stealing their signal, refusing to pay the retransmission fees that cable companies pay. But Aereo's argument that it was just bringing legal "over-the-air" broadcasts to consumers via tiny antennas won in district court, and it won again at a key appeals court hearing. Since then, networks have made wild claims that they'll stop broadcasting, and they are now aiming to topple the key legal decision underpinning Aereo's business.

There's no question that the networks have the right to pursue those appeals, but in a complaint (PDF) filed today and published by TechCrunch, Aereo has said that CBS' threat to fight it in market after market is going too far. Aereo is planning to launch in Boston on May 15, with more than 20 new markets to follow.

That plan, tweeted by a CBS PR rep and described by CBS CEO Les Moonves to Deadline Hollywood, is simple venue shopping, says Aereo. CBS and the other networks have already lost their court battles twice. "[T]hreatened follow-on suits would be an attempt to avoid or evade the District Court's rulings... by seeking 'do-overs' in other courts," write Aereo lawyers. "The threatened follow-on suits would involve the same technology, involve the same witnesses, and implicate the same legal and factual issues that are already the subject of the Consolidated 2012 Actions."

Whatever complaints the networks have should be resolved in the same New York federal court they've already sued in, argues Aereo. To allow a slew of lawsuits over the same issue would allow the networks to try their hand in multiple courts as Aereo expands.

In any case, it's clear that the battle between Aereo and the networks is hot and getting hotter. The networks see Aereo as a real threat to the practice of getting "retransmission fees," payments by cable companies that have only been around for about 20 years.

The hard-to-believe "we're going cable" threats from Fox and CBS, combined with the credible threats of multiple lawsuits against Aereo, are a testament to how threatened the networks find the TV-over-Internet startup.